The Christian evangelical leader Jerry Falwell has died at the age of 73. He was the founder of the Moral Majority and a pioneering figure in the religious right. He led campaigns against abortion, gay rights, pornography and bans on school prayer. During the 1960s Falwell condemned the Rev. Martin Luther King and what he described as the civil wrongs movement. In the 1980s Falwell praised South Africa’s apartheid government as a “bulwark for Christian civilization” and campaigned against economic sanctions. Falwell once described Nobel Peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu as a phony. Shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, Falwell appeared on Pat Robertson’s 700 Club and blamed liberal groups in the United States for the attacks.

Jerry Falwell: “I really believe that the pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, and the ACLU and People for the American Way — all of them who have tried to secularize America — I point the finger in their face and say, 'You helped this happen.'”

On Tuesday, several of the leading Republican presidential candidates praised Falwell. Senator John McCain described him as “a man of distinguished accomplishment who devoted his life to serving his faith and country.”